You are here! Kiosks help you navigate island pathways with ease

Let's say you're a tourist riding your bike down the new pathways along Pope Avenue on a summer day. You're young son is peddling along happily behind you on his rented bike with training wheels attached, still trying to lick clean the sticky smile of the Frozen Moo ice cream around his mouth.

Then the inevitable: "Mommy," he says,

"I have to go to the bathroom."

What do you do? It's too far back to the condo. You don't know what's available nearby. If only there were some kind of map!

Fear not, brave tourist.

In a continuing effort to make Hilton Head user-friendly and encourage people to leave their cars at home, the town just finished installing 11 new kiosks on pathways around the island, and renovating nine existing ones. The kiosks now have highly detailed maps showing all 50 plus miles of the island pathway system and a close up of the immediate area.

But the maps also contain specific information showing the locations of eating areas, parks, points of interest, rest stops and anything else a cyclist might be looking for.

With a prominent "You are here" marking, the maps could help people find their way around the island as easily as Epcot Center.

"It gets maps out there ... where people would be confused and scratch their heads and try to figure out where to go next, especially for tourists who might not know their way around," said Frank Babel, president of the Squeaky Wheels cycling advocacy group, which helped the town with the project. "That helps get people out of their plantations and get them going."

The town's Facilities Management Department designed the new kiosks and had Sign Design of Bluffton install them, said assistant facilities manager Julian Walls.

Adding the 11 kiosks cost a little more than $130,000, Walls said. The town now has 20 kiosksspread out from Fish Haul Park on the north end to Coligny Beach Park on the south end.

The maps do more than just direct bicyclists. Each one contains descriptive and educational information about the island and surrounding area. The map on the land of a future park at the old Rock's/Remy's site, for instance, has the story of Charlie Simmons Sr.'s ferries to the mainland before the bridge was built and the history of the shell ring in Sea Pines. There are also safety rules and information on where paths are private or public.

"It's like a little information center," Walls said.